My Grandma is giving me her Manx buggy she bought in the 80's I think its a 1200cc air cooled. I drove it a few years back and it would take off sideways with no problem, it was very fast. It was 1/2 restored a few years back by a dune buggy shop and never compleatly finished. As soon as I clean out enough space in my garage & find a VW tow bar I'm going to bring it home and finish it up.

That thing should haul ass with a 1.8 FI engine. Have you ever been to Silver Lake? Its on the other side of Michigan from you (just south of Lundington, MI) but it would be worth the drive. Let me know if you plan a trip there next summer, I have a Yamaha Raptor and a 4x4 Truck, and maybe I'd have my buggy done by then. Oh yeah I have a bus too LOL.

nope, never been to silver lake...but i'd like to go sometime. It's a pretty good hike from here, but i could take the bus and stay a few days.

Made good progress on tearing down the old vw fox yesterday. It's the donor car. I also found a spare 1.8 liter race motor for free. it runs. Haven't gotten the drive train out of it yet.

Oddly enough, the motor in the front wheel drive fox is not transverse.

I have no expierence with dune buggies and thought it would be much easier to start with a rolling chassis, but where's the fun in that? I think i'll enjoy the difficulty of creating my own. I've been looking at lots of photos and gathering information. They're very simple, just an oversized go-cart.